Chicago-based group saves Q-C Mallards

Professional hockey will return to the i wireless Center in
Moline for a 16th season after Club 9 Sports of Chicago purchased
the Quad-City Mallards on Friday afternoon.

The team will return to the Class AA Central Hockey League,
where it debuted a year ago under the direction of first-year owner
Eric Karls before the Canadian millionaire abruptly shut down the
team a month ago.

Club 9, a multi-faceted sports marketing and consulting and
management firm, completed the negotiated buyout from Karls late
Friday afternoon.

“We literally just signed the documents this evening,” Jon
Pritchett, the group’s CEO and operating partner, said Friday
night. “It’s an asset-purchase agreement.”

Club 9 becomes the fourth owner of a Quad-City pro hockey team
in the past four years. Karls succeeded Chris Lencheski, who was
recruited to resurrect the Double-A Mallards after Dennis Voss and
his Quad-Cities Sports Ventures Group folded the American Hockey
League Flames after two costly seasons.

Despite the turnover, Pritchett believes hockey in the
Quad-Cities can work.

“There’s a long history of success and a good fan base,”
Pritchett said of the market. “It’s not going to be a short-term
fix. It’s going to take some consistency. We understand the numbers
and economics. Sometimes it’s an expensive start. We know that it’s
going to be more than a three- or four-year process.”

Howard Cornfield, who built the Mallards into a Double-A
juggernaut on the ice and at the gate from 1997 through 2001, said
he hopes Club 9 can make the team a success.

Attendance averages topped 7,600 for five straight years but
dropped annually from an all-time high of 8,646 in 1998 to a record
low of 2,812 last year.

But Club 9, which was a contender to assume Mallards ownership
last year before being outbid by Karls, comes in with sports
experience and eyes wide open, Cornfield said.

“They have experience in hockey and they should know what they
are getting into,” he said. “They know it has to be run correctly
here and they are good businessmen. None of the challenges of this
market should be a surprise to them.

“I think Eric came in with good intentions, but he came in as a
fan,” Cornfield said of Karls.

The new group already has been involved with player personnel
decisions and is believed to have submitted a list of protected
players from last year’s Mallards roster ahead of Friday’s start to
the league’s annual summer meetings.

“Our plan is to, as soon as we can get mobilized, get staff back
in place and get a coach hired,” Pritchett said. “We plan on coming
in next week and really get our feet on the ground and meet with
people. You can’t run a minor-league business or any business
remotely. You have to be involved. We want to be there as much as
we can and we are going to know what’s going on on a daily
basis.”

The new owners and coach are expected to introduced at a midweek
news conference. Frank Anzalone, who has coached the Mallards for
the past two seasons, is among a handful of candidates, Pritchett
said.

“We haven’t made a final decision on a coach,” Pritchett said.
“We are talking with some coaches and are expecting to make a
decision soon as early as end of the weekend or the first part of
next week.”

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The Chicago-based Club 9 group includes former NBA general
manager Carl Scheer, a familiar name in Quad-City minor-league
sports circles, among its partners.

The organization formerly owned the ECHL Greenville Grrrowl. It
has helped develop arenas in five communities, and its partners
have held positions with 11 major and minor league teams.

Scott Mullen, executive director of the i wireless Center, said
Club 9 will assume the final three years of an existing lease with
the Moline arena.

“Anything can happen in minor league sports, but I don’t think
anybody would be jumping in and spending this kind of money if the
plan wasn’t to do it for long term and to turn things around,”
Mullen said. “How effective they are while they’re here will
determine how long they stay.”

Club 9 Sports is a consortium consisting of Prometheus Capital
Partners LLC, a Chicago investment bank headed by managing partner
John Prutch; Tobacco Road Capitalists, a management and consulting
firm; and ScheerSports Inc., a sports management and marketing firm
founded in 1991 by Scheer.

Scheer, who is listed as a senior adviser, has an extensive
sports background that has crossed paths with the Quad-City minor
league sports scene on a couple of levels.

The former general manager of the NBA’s Denver Nuggets, Los
Angeles Clippers and Charlotte Bobcats, also was an early
front-office force in the American Basketball Association.

Scheer was commissioner of the Continental Basketball
Association when the Quad-City Thunder joined the league in
February of 1987, but left before they tipped off in November of
that year.

He also was a founding partner of the arenafootball2 Carolina
Rhinos when the Quad-City Steamwheelers were winning the league’s
first two titles in 2000 and 2001.